Confession #9: I'd like to be an instrument of peace
Peace is so much bigger of a concept than I think I even really understand.
As humans, we crave it.
We fear the unknown and the future, because we don't know if there will be peace or pain in that place. We get set in our ways because we want comfort more than risk, even risk for something better.
This can't be the mindset of a Christian! We are not to be people who seek our own peace to the extent that we are disobedient for the sake of comfort, but rather people who are peacemakers, instruments of the peace of God.
I love the heart behind this prayer by St. Francis of Assisi:
Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace!
That where there is hatred, I may bring love.
That where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness.
That where there is discord, I may bring harmony.
That where there is error, I may bring truth.
That where there is doubt, I may bring faith.
That where there is despair, I may bring hope.
That where there are shadows, I may bring light.
That where there is sadness, I may bring joy.
Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort, than to be comforted.
To understand, than to be understood.
To love, than to be loved.
For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.
It is by dying that one awakens to Eternal Life.
As humans, we crave it.
We fear the unknown and the future, because we don't know if there will be peace or pain in that place. We get set in our ways because we want comfort more than risk, even risk for something better.
This can't be the mindset of a Christian! We are not to be people who seek our own peace to the extent that we are disobedient for the sake of comfort, but rather people who are peacemakers, instruments of the peace of God.
I love the heart behind this prayer by St. Francis of Assisi:
Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace!
That where there is hatred, I may bring love.
That where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness.
That where there is discord, I may bring harmony.
That where there is error, I may bring truth.
That where there is doubt, I may bring faith.
That where there is despair, I may bring hope.
That where there are shadows, I may bring light.
That where there is sadness, I may bring joy.
Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort, than to be comforted.
To understand, than to be understood.
To love, than to be loved.
For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.
It is by dying that one awakens to Eternal Life.
For more on this, I recommend for women a talk given by Elisabeth Elliot called "Made to be Mothers." There is so much truth here: http://blb-ra.blueletterbible.
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